Chapter 233 – Floor 41: Part 6

  “A Starless Night.”

  Lumina watched as the street around her was engulfed in darkness; although damaged and deserted, it was still bright with the afternoon sun. A sudden chill swept through the air, and the sunlight streaming down from above faltered.

  It was as if a massive shadow was looming, creeping across the sky with an ominous swiftness in response to Mathew’s call. The darkness descended like a heavy curtain, sweeping across the buildings and streets around them but oddly leaving most of the city unaffected.

  Mathew had worked on his control under his Celestial Mentor’s tutelage and kept the area of effect confined to Lumina, Ironclad and Titaness. The shadow consumed the sky with an insatiable hunger, an inky blot that seemed to expand and ripple.

  Once brilliant and warm, the sunlight faded instantly, leaving behind a twilight that was unnatural and sinister until only a pitch-black sky remained.

  Lumina felt cold and afraid as if the darkness was drawing the life and warmth inside her into the void. Titaness, her eyes crimson in anger, slowed her thrashing as her rage dimmed.

  Ironclad’s metal figure was covered in a thin layer of frost, but the mechanical man seemed unaffected by the changes around them. Flickers of light flashed across his visor, and his analysis of Mathew’s power gave him insight into what was happening.

  “Interesting, but largely ineffective.” Ironclad expressed quietly, a trace of interest entering his tone.

  The oppressive darkness wrapped around them like a shroud, and Lumina fought against the growing despair. She could hear the distant echoes of the city beyond, a reminder of life that seemed so far removed from their current predicament.

  Titaness gave a sudden roar and shook her head. Her rage re-ignited in spectacular fashion, and she once again charged at Mathew.

  Unperturbed, Mathew continued to speak the words of the Celestial Spell.

  “A Starless Night, A Bloody Moon.”

  The sky hung heavy with an oppressive darkness, a vast expanse above completely devoid of stars or any light. Lumina stared at that void when a crimson object slowly emerged from the horizon.

  The Blood Moon’s red light bled into the void, a haunting orb that seemed to pulse with a terrifying life. It cast an eerie glow across the debris-strewn street around them. The air was thick with an overpowering perversion, a sense of wrongness that permeated everything.

  Shadows stretched and twisted, writhing like serpents across the ground. They curled around blocks of concrete and loose pavement, extending tendrils that wrapped around objects. Lumina felt them bending around her feet, gripping her boots.

  Titaness and Ironclad, feeling the intent behind Mathew’s strange abilities, had it much worse. The shadows clutched at their legs, slowly working their way up the Villain’s bodies. Restricting their movement, Titaness began to beat her hands against the ground in an attempt to dislodge them.

  But Ironclad, strangely, seemed to accept the shadows and allowed them to cover his body. All the while, his analysis continued.

  The Celestial Spell wasn’t done yet; the Moon’s light flickered and created an illusion of figures with faces that slowly emerged from the darkness. Lumina was reminded of a horror movie she had seen where the dead had risen from their graves.

  The shadow beings acted in a similar way, tearing their way out of the ground and rising to their feet to shamble toward the Villains; the darkness that formed their bodies created arms that reached toward them.

  A chill swept through the air, and the temperature dropped sharply as the blood moon reached its zenith directly overhead, filling the sky with its crimson light. Wisps of fog crept along the street, swirling in and out of the shadows to create a terrifying scene.

  Titaness struggled against the encroaching shadows, feeling their icy grip tightening around her legs. Panic surged within her, at odds with the rage she felt, as she beat her fists against the ground. She was desperate to shake off the clinging darkness, not just from fear but from the overpowering desire to kill the young man whose strange ability had devoured the sun.

  Each strike of her fist felt futile; the shadows were relentless. They crept higher, their cold tendrils constricting her movements like a vice.

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  Ironclad, however, stood completely still. There was a calm radiating from his metallic frame that Lumina found unsettling. The shadows engulfed half his body, swirling around his limbs as if they were an extension of his being.

  His visor flickered with data, processing the strange phenomenon with a dispassionate efficiency.

  “Interesting. They seek to incapacitate rather than consume.” Ironclad murmured, his voice steady. He had thought that such a powerful ability would cause the young Hero to lose control of it, but it seems he was mistaken.

  Ironclad immediately began to reassess his evaluation of Mathew.

  Lumina backed away slowly from the frightful sight, taking comfort in the proximity of Mathew as he stood in front of her with his hands raised.

  “Mathew, what are you doing?” She asked, her voice quivering in barely controlled fear. Mathew frowned as he observed the two Villains. Ironclad seemed unaffected by the Celestial Spell, and Titaness was showing signs of shrugging off the shadows.

  As her frustration grew, so did her rage. She was growing even stronger, rather than weaker. Mathew took a deep breath, focused his will in order to contain the effects to just the two Villains in front of him, and spoke the next verse of the Celestial Spell.

  “A Starless Night, A Bloody Moon, A Foul Land of Blight.”

  The street around them twisted and mutated, warping into a nightmarish landscape. The pavement cracked, and grotesque patches of withered vegetation sprouted from the ground, their colours drained to sickly shades.

  A noxious, corrosive mist seeped from the fissures, curling around the villain's legs like a living entity, filling the air with a rancid stench that made Lumina’s stomach turn. The once-familiar street in the center of New York City had transformed into a land of blight, a foul place where the air felt heavy and harsh.

  But it was the changes to the shadows created by the Blood Moon that had finally given Titaness pause, allowing her rage to subside and her mind to clear. The shadow figures had turned from humanoid into monstrous creatures.

  They bore features made of twisted flesh, half-formed and dripping with corruption, their eyes filled with hunger. The darkness that was wrapped around them had solidified into rotten vines of a deep green. Titaness felt thorns piercing her hardened flesh, and a strange burning sensation began to spread from the wounds.

  Ironclad, unaffected by the thorny vines, had his own concerns. The corrosive mist had begun to eat away at his metallic suit. It was beginning to pit in places, the structural integrity weakening a little more each moment he spent in this place.

  With no time to lose, Ironclad raised both of his hands toward Mathew with his palms out. Gathering the energy from his suit's core, a flash of bright purple light streaked across the distance between them. It pierced through the horrid monsters and the clinging vines, burning them from existence.

  Before it could reach Mathew, however, a wave of darkness surged upward from the ground and consumed the energy beam. Ironclad’s sensors tracked the energy, first from the shadows that had devoured it to the Blood Moon above.

  “Evade!”

  The Crimson Moon flashed, turning purple in an instant, and a beam of light struck the ground where Ironclad had been standing. The armoured figure flew through the air, propelled by a booster beneath his feet.

  Titaness flung several of the hideous monsters away from her and leapt into the air, striking the side of a building and digging her hand into the concrete to leverage herself.

  “That won’t help you. There’s still time to surrender.” Mathew said, lowering his arms and placing his hands in his pockets before continuing.

  “Before I use the next verse, there won’t be anything left of you to capture.” He threatened, and even the Titaness felt a chill from his words.

  “I’ve never encountered powers like yours before.” Ironclad responded from where he was hovering in the air.

  “I doubt you ever will; they’re unique.” Mathew replied with a shrug.

  “Only the weak surrender.” Titaness shouted, already preparing herself to push off the side of the building and strike at Mathew. Her muscles were tensing when she heard the young man react.

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” Mathew said as he raised his arms back toward the sky to begin the next verse. Titaness jumped from the building, and several pods opened on Ironclad’s back, revealing rows of missiles and other weapons. A voice spoke out from beside Mathew.

  “I believe that’s enough for today.”

  So sudden was the sound of a woman’s voice and her appearance that Mathew paused and looked at her.

  He found a beautiful woman standing on the street next to him. She was unaffected by the corrosive air, unfazed by the darkness or the Bloody Moon above them. She had hair as dark as the shadows Mathew had created, matched by a dress of the same colour that contained specks of light like stars in the night sky.

  Mathew’s eyes locked onto her bright green orbs, and he found that he couldn’t look away.

  “Obsidian. Class ‘S.’” Lumina whispered from behind Mathew, shocked that such a high-ranked villain would appear here. Even Blaze from the League of Heroes wouldn’t be a match one-on-one with Obsidian.

  “You’re an interesting one. Class ‘C.’” Obsidian scoffed before continuing.

  “I see the League of Heroes is as accurate as ever with their Rankings. If you’re class ‘C’ then Blaze is a ‘B.’” Obsidian said, gesturing with her hand at the effects Mathew’s spell had on the world around them. Casually, she reached out and pointed at the ground beside her.

  A pillar of obsidian slowly rose from the ground, and inside, there was a swirling of Mana. Mathew could feel a tug from it, a pulling sensation that was centred in the Obsidian. He was surprised when the corrosive gases were sucked into the stone, followed by the corrupted ground, the monster and the shadows.

  Finally, the Bloody Moon in the sky above shattered into splinters of light and was drawn into the pillar of Obsidian until the five of them stood under the bright midday sun on a debris-strewn street in the city. There was no sign of Mathew’s Celestial Magic.

  “We’ll be in touch, Mr. Larson.” Obsidian said, giving him a smile before she walked into the pillar of stone, disappearing within. She was followed a moment later by Titaness and Ironclad.

  When they were gone, the pillar shattered, and the pieces vanished as if they had never been there in the first place.